Little changes add up. It can be discouraging, staring at that blinking cursor. And 500 words a day doesn’t seem like a lot. Because it isn’t–just like one workout a week, or a month, isn’t a lot. The secret isn’t to kill yourself in the gym every day for a week and then give up, because you’ve made yourself so sore and sick and tired and you still aren’t Giselle Bundchen. Just like the secret isn’t to lock yourself in your (hopefully figurative) garret and do nothing but write until you can’t see straight. Because there is no secret–except consistency. People who write a little, and then a little more, every day, end up with books. People who spend time searching for fad answers don’t.